1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a medium discharge device that stacks and discharges a medium to externally to the apparatus and an image reading apparatus which is provided with the medium discharge device.
2. Related Art
An automatic feeding device of a document as the medium (referred to as an auto document feeder (ADF)) is provided in a scanner that is an example of the image reading apparatus, and is configured to perform automatic feeding and reading of a plurality of documents. The plurality of fed documents are read in an image reading portion that is provided on a transport direction downstream side of the auto document feeder.
In such a scanner, the medium discharge device may be provided that is configured such that a discharge roller pair is provided on the downstream side of the image reading portion, the documents are discharged externally to the apparatus, and a plurality of discharged documents which are received are stacked in discharge order to a discharge paper receiving tray (also referred to as a discharge paper stacker and the like).
For example, JP-A-2014-051338 discloses a medium discharge device with a configuration in which paper sheets are discharged outside of an apparatus by a second transport roller 140 and a second driven roller 141 which are provided on the downstream side of an imaging portion 130 as the image reading portion, and paper sheets are stacked on a front surface cover 105a, an upper surface cover 105b, and an auxiliary cover 105c as the discharge paper receiving tray.
In such a medium discharge device, there is a configuration in which since a plurality of sheets of the medium are stacked in the discharge paper receiving tray, as shown in FIG. 17, after a medium mounting surface 100a of the discharge paper receiving tray 100 is provided further on the lower side than the discharge roller pair 102 and the medium (reference numeral P) is fed from the discharge roller pair 102, the medium is held a predetermined distance L from the discharge roller pair 102 and is landed and discharged on the medium mounting surface 100a of the discharge paper receiving tray 100 at a predetermined angle θ1.
Here, in a case where resilience of the medium P is strong, that is, in a case where the medium has high rigidity, a tip end of the medium P which is fed from the discharge roller pair 102 progresses approximately straight up to a landing point A, and is landed on the medium mounting surface 100a at the angle θ1. After landing of the tip end of the medium P, the medium P is further fed and discharged by the discharge roller pair 102, and is mounted in the discharge paper receiving tray 100.
Meanwhile, in a case where resilience of the medium is weak, that is, in a case where there is a medium P′ with low rigidity such as thin paper (indicated by a dotted line in FIG. 17), the medium P′ which is fed from the discharge roller pair 102 may hang down under self weight prior to reaching the landing point A, and land further on the upstream side in the medium transport direction upstream side than the landing point A (for example, landing point B in FIG. 17) at an angle θ2 which is larger than the angle θ1.
When landing on the medium mounting surface 100a with the tip end of the medium P′ with weak resilience at the large angle θ2, and the medium P′ is further fed to the downstream side by the discharge roller pair 102, there is a risk that the tip end of the medium P′ is caught and buckles on the medium mounting surface 100a. When the already discharged medium buckles, a concern that a defect such as jamming due to impact with the medium that is buckled by a subsequent medium, or reversing of loading order increases.